Bayer forms gene editing partnership with CRISPR Therapeutics

FRANKFURT Dec 21 (Reuters) - Bayer will spend
325 million euros ($353 million) on research into a promising
new gene editing technology as part of a joint venture with
biotech firm CRISPR Therapeutics.

Under the deal, the German drugmaker will pay for the joint
venture's research over the next five years, 300 million euros
in total. The venture will be 50 percent owned by the partners.

Bayer will buy a minority stake in CRISPR Therapeutics for
35 million euros.

CRISPR Therapeutics, headquartered in Basel, Switzerland,
with research operations based in Cambridge, Massachusetts, uses
the so-called CRISPR-Cas9 technology, which has become the
preferred method of gene editing in research labs due to its
ease of use.

CRISPR, which stands for clustered regularly interspaced
short palindromic repeats, allows scientists to edit genes by
using biological "scissors" that operate a bit like a
word-processing programme that can find and replace defects.

The joint venture will look into ways to fix malfunctioning
genes in parts of the body that are at the origin of certain
diseases, such as liver cells that fail to produce blood
coagulation factors, the cause of haemophilia.

If successful, such genetic therapy could cure chronic
diseases that now require life-long drug treatments.

One of the challenges Bayer aims to tackle is how to bring
the gene editing mechanism to the diseased cells.

CRISPR Therapeutics will contribute its gene-editing
technology, while Bayer will make its protein engineering
expertise and knowledge about diseases available.

Bayer has the option to secure exclusive rights to use the
joint venture's intellectual property in the areas of blood
disorders, blindness and congenital heart diseases.

CRISPR Therapeutics will have the exclusive rights to any
technology for human use from the collaboration beyond the three
disease areas, while Bayer will retain the rights for non-human
uses, such as agricultural applications.
($1 = 0.9204 euros)
(Reporting by Ludwig Burger, editing by Louise Heavens)